Let’s talk about rifles and so-called assault weapons.
You can’t call a AK-47 a “Machine gun”. It’s like calling a Mercedes a “Bus”. Machine guns are mounted on tripods, or carried by very big guys. The Browning Automatic Rifle (or BAR) is a big machine gun. Clyde Barrow used one.
The SAW (squad automatic weapon) as also a big machine gun. Both of these weapons do better mounted on tripods.
Smaller, rifle oriented automatic weapons are called “sub machine guns”. An AK-47, converted to full auto, is a sub-machine gun. You have to get this point correct in your novels, or anyone who is in the military will tune out. you lost them.
Civilian weapons since the 1950’s are never fully automatic. You must apply for a very expensive license and undergo a background check to get a license to own a fully automatic weapon.
A lot of realism has overtaken Hollywood. It used to be that you saw someone shooting thousands of rounds from a weapon in movies, and never reloading. Until the movie Dirty Harry, which featured the first real tough guy lines, and the first real plot focused on realistic ammo counts in weapons.
most rifles carry 30 round magazines. The 100 round super magazines available for AR-15’s and AK-47’s are prone to jamming unless they are carefully maintained and carefully loaded. By having a person who’s an armorer in a story, you can conceivably get away with those 100-round drums. But they’re HEAVY, and a misdemeanor in many states to own one.
A hunting rifle will carry usually 5 rounds. Sniper Rifles, it depends on the type. Some are loaded with one round at a time, others carry 5-7 rounds.
The infamous M1 Garand (pronounced Ger-und, not gr-aaand) carries 8 rounds, and it’s one heavy gun. It has to be. WWII training films for the M1 show the instructor explaining that the M1 “packs a wallop”. The heavier the cartridge and grain count, the heavier the weapon will be to control the recoil. The M1 is the only rifle with a “clip”. All others have “magazines”.
To load the M1, yank back (notice the word – don’t gradually and easily pull back on the lever – trust me on this) on the lever. Pop the clip in place with your thumb. Let the lever go.
If you did step 1 right,, step 3 was painless. If you were loving and gentle with the lever, step 2 really hurt. The bolt snaps home and catches your thumb painfully, giving you a nice welt and a black spot on your thumb nail. Realism was used in Band of Brothers when you see Sergeant Lipton in a tree, shooting – and you clearly see the black spot on his thumbnail. That spot is called “M1 thumb”.
AR-15 – this is one well engineered weapon. It’s funny that people try to vilify this weapon. Essentially, it’s an M16 – a slightly amped up .22 rifle with a magazine. The AR-15 is made by a number of manufacturers, some of them lightweight, others with advanced picatinny rails allowing attachment of all kinds of scopes, sights, lights and other accessories. They tend to be so heavy you end up not wanting to add anything to them! Many shoot both .227 and 5.56 mm ammo. Make sure you know what you’re talking about – if you say early on the AR is a .227, you CANNOT put a 5.56 round in it later! If you say the rifle is a 5.56, you can use either. The iron sights on an AR-15 are not complicated, and good up to 50 yards or so. Scopes can increase your distance to 300 yards.
The AK-47 – if you’re trying to suggest someone dug a weapon out of a muddy river bank, dunks it in the river to clear out the barrel, then aims and fires the weapon with no cleaning or oiling – you’ve got an AK for sure. You can’t do that to an AR-15 unless you’d like it to blow up in your face.
The AK is as bargain basement as you can get as a weapon. with one frightening bullet (the 7.62 Makarov), it shoots with a big kick. The AK can put up with a lot of abuse before it quits on you. Russian Spetznatz soldiers in training have to master the art of pushups – using a fully loaded AK-47.
Anton Kalashnikov designed the gun for a good reason. The battles in Russia in WWII saw exceptionally cold winters, and some guns actually froze up. Kalashnikov had to invent a gun that could fight in all the varieties of Russian weather (spring, for instance, is usually a three month period of mud). This meant arctic, summer with mosquitos, fall, and torrential springtime rains. The key to it was a cheap weapon to manufacture with very loose tolerances. The AK requires little maintenance. I’d still maintain it, but that’s because you’re paying $600 for one and you might as well take care of it.
The good news is, unlike many rifle and pistol ammo, you can walk into any gun store on earth and buy 7.62mm rounds.
Full auto weapons… the AR-15 today is designed for the military with a 3-round burst option. This is usually the maximum number of rounds you can effectively shoot accurately on full auto. You have to apply a lot of downward force to prevent muzzle climb on a fully auto weapon.
Next – we move on to other weapons!
